Friday, December 25, 2015

A Proper Postscript

The tour of our friend’s new house was making its way back to the rest of the party when we stopped halfway down the stairwell. This tall, wiry fellow was standing in our way, seemingly as part of his plan. It was the same guy from earlier in the evening, the one who’d made a comment toward Emily that could be taken as eccentric, hilarious, or creepy from different angles. He continued to chat us up, relaxed yet intense, with these occasional off-the-wall remarks. I thought they were hilarious. Emily? The way she restrained a smirk while giving him the side-eye suggested she was either unsure of him or embarrassed to be amused. It took a few hours, but once she started responding back, it became clear that this guy was winning her over.

When Emily went to the kitchen with a friend, the guy leaned toward me and asked, “So, are you two affiliated?” I thought it was a quirky way of asking if we were dating. Quirky but memorable… you know, I guess that could summarize Jon and that whole encounter. I told him we were not an item, which gave him the green light to ask for Emily’s num--

“Oh, I’ve heard this part before,” Jenny interjected, willing to amuse me nonetheless as I completed the story.

The start of Jon and Emily, two friends I was about to visit, was familiar to Jenny. She probably first heard the story before we attended their wedding eight years ago. I’ll bet she’s heard the tale of their beginning at least five or six times. She’s used to me repeating stories. Call me (insert mediocre 90s sitcom you like more than you admittedly should), because I’m always on rerun.

The details of my friends’ first encounter weren’t even important at the time I was sharing them for the fifth sixth Nth occasion. I tell my wife passages like that all the time, sometimes in passing, sometimes to reshape a story with new information, sometimes using context to express a different sentiment, sometimes just because I like to share things with her.

I could apply a lot of that last (run-on) sentence to what it was like writing in this blog.




My dissertation defense was a long time coming. Although the project was completed in 2014, the idea originated seven years prior… give or take a month from the time this blog was last updated. I’ve written a lot in my area of study in that time. It’s funny, though: when it comes to me and “publishing,” I don’t just think of the sexual violence research. I reminisce on my writing prior to this, when I’d sit at a computer writing boxing articles from my bachelor apartment. I’ll say this: my area of research may be controversial among the general public, but I’ve never been called anything like “half breed hack” from someone reading my academic writing. Not to my knowledge, at least.

I experienced plenty of stumbling blocks along the way to completing my dissertation. I was regularly exhausted by a surly, ever-critical colleague who put it upon herself to judge my intentions before “allowing” me to proceed. There was the day I felt that fizzy head dizziness when I’d discovered that not only had my flash drive been corrupted, but also I’d been incorrectly backing up my research database (I’m savvy with computers like my neurotic dog is savvy with boxes blocking his way into a room). The biggest obstacle, though, was Mr. Procrastination. Putting things off a week was more the indirect roadblock. The momentum I lost by getting distracted by things like my clinical cases, deciding what Jenny and I should do to add to our (metaphorical) memory scrapbook, and checking IMDB to confirm which actors from a decades-old movie are now dead hurt my efficiency and really slowed me down.

Despite all the inevitable adversity, the day came for me to defend my years-long work to a small room of scholars and colleagues. I usually feel anxiety in anticipation for a big event by overthinking various scenarios, but I was unusually calm that day. Scratch that: I was unusually calm until I forgot the most up-to-date version of my defense and had Jenny scrambling for it in an adjacent building 10 minutes before showtime. Whatever: I’d been calm long enough to be well-rested and eat a sandwich, so I had enough fuel to get me through.

The details of the actual defense are a blur, but the aftermath was very vivid. I stood outside the door pacing with Jenny, well confident of the outcome but antsy to have this all just come to its proper conclusion. She looked proud of me. In most situations that’s good enough for me… but I wanted that Ph.D., and my university did not include an awesome woman’s pride in the prerequisites for my degree. About ten minutes later, my advisor waved me into the room and looked over with a smile. She offered a nod of respect, shook my hand, and referred to me as “Dr.” to indicate I’d achieved my longtime goal. For all intents and purposes, I’d be able to call myself Dr. the next day, once I deposited my completed dissertation and filled out the proverbial paperwork.

When everything was finalized that next day, I was alone in a room with an administrative person I’d never met before and probably will never see again. I don’t really remember the moment it became official, but I remember what happened immediately after.

I stood up, walked toward the exit, and stumbled head first into the door.

I’d pushed on a door with a large, unambiguous “Pull” sign.

It’s the kind of blunder you would normally edit out of a key moment, but it was quite the visual to me. I knew immediately that this was what I’d remember best about that event. To fail to properly use a door immediately after receiving your Ph.D.: it was an imperfect ending that felt quite fitting.

Imperfect endings rarely transcend big moments the way that did. Most of the time the details just fade away. In other instances, they’ll continue to nag at you, leaving you itching to rewrite the ending. When you can do something to alter those kinds of endings, maybe you should.




The iPhone. President Barack Obama. The popularity of Taylor Swift and Justin Bieber. NFL players Adrian Peterson and Calvin Johnson. The debate over what happened in the finale of The Sopranos. None of these things existed the last time I updated this blog. Michael Jackson, Heath Ledger, Boris Yeltsin, and Anna Nicole Smith were still kicking. Hell, I probably visited MySpace soon after I’d last clicked “publish.”

I never consciously made a decision to stop writing here. I’d say it just gradually happened, but can not doing something happen? In any event, I could pitch a number of reasons for the decline of my recreational writing without resorting to hackneyed “I got so busy” excuses. The efforts and energy put into my research (I know, I know, this sounds like an “I got so busy,” but wait for it…) left me less than inspired to spend my spare time typing in front of a computer screen when that’s what much of my day job involved. I became more social and spent less time by myself (and with my computer). My attention span weakened to the point that I became too distractible to follow through with tasks that don’t work well on the installment plan. Increased use of social media—by the public, colleagues, and prospective employers—made me second-guess what I could/should relay online.

But probably the biggest, yet simplest, reason for the end of my writing here is that my life changed. In most ways (read: Jenny and all she is) this has been for the better, but no matter the changes, life is simply different. Many aspects of my life have stabilized as I sprinted, jogged, limped, danced, and strolled through my mid-to-late 20s and early 30s. In those times I need to express myself, vent, or explore musings on the fly, I have a wonderful partner as my go-to outlet.

This blog was written by an intermittently lonely guy, age 19-24, still finding himself. I liked that guy (though several parts of College Anthony in particular make me cringe), but that version is not entirely around anymore. It’s much like the way a picture of me from those days would only resemble—and by no means represent—how I’d physically look in a picture today. I’m not suggesting I’ve found myself and have life figured out, but the scope of that search has certainly changed. Slowly but surely, sitting for hours to write in a blog no longer filled the purpose it once did.



         
We were sitting alone in the lounge of our loft apartment building, two emptied bottles of homebrew sitting on a nearby end table. The Psych finale was on the television, and we were watching to see how things would end. At one point early on, Jenny giggled at something on the screen. I felt butterflies in my chest, as I tend to experience whenever she does Jenny things. I don’t mean to trivialize what makes her great because she’s an amazing, multi-talented, generous spirit of a woman, but it’s often the little things like that that make me take a mental snapshot of how much her partnership means to me.

The Psych finale was off to a promising start, which we were admittedly surprised about given our feelings toward the shit in the final season. Most of the time, perfect send-offs don’t happen. My dad’s final words to me were, “I love you too.” About as perfect of final words as you can imagine, right? Nonetheless, aside from the obvious fact that he left us way too soon, even that was a flawed send-off since he'd lie unconscious for over 24 hours after those words.

I sometimes wonder if a “perfect ending” is even possible. No matter how much we try to compartmentalize, life and events don’t occur in a vacuum. Going back to my dad, there’s a moment in his final days that always stuck with me. After bringing him outside to see our dog one last time, I was guiding him in his wheelchair back to his hospital floor. As the elevator door opened, I glanced toward the right wing of the floor, an area I hadn't explored. I’m sure I’d read the signs before, but I hadn’t really processed that over to the right was the baby delivery unit. I wondered how many lives had begun that hour, that day, before turning my dad’s wheelchair to the left back to hospice. Within the same bubble, beginnings and endings were occurring in synchrony.

Jenny and I thoroughly enjoyed that hour of watching Psych together. Once the finale actually finale’d, we looked at each other and smiled in relief. Given that this was a show we'd followed over the years, we were invested in the send off. Jenny indicated she was happy with the episode, and I was glad to see the series wrap-up pleased her.

I felt similarly. I knew it wasn't a perfect ending, but it was way better than how it would have been if they hadn’t returned and wrapped things up in a fitting manner.

In my head I thought, “this will definitely do.”

Eventually, we walked back to our apartment together, saying hi to a ridiculously excited puppy and continuing the everydayness of our life together.

Saturday, January 06, 2007

2006 Music Awards

Note: this year sucked so badly for music that I could only come up with Top 5's instead of the standard Top 10.

5 Biggest Surprises
5. Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Show Your Bones
4. Mat Kearney, Nothing Left to Lose
3. Bravestate, Farewell to the Castle EP
2. Lily Allen, Alright, Still
1. Albert Hammond, Jr., Yours to Keep

5 Biggest Disappointments
5. John Legend, Once Again
4. Keane, Under the Iron Sea
3. Badly Drawn Boy, Born in the UK
2. Yo La Tengo, I am Not Afraid of You and I Will Beat Your Ass
1. Sondre Lerche and the Faces Down Quartet, Duper Sessions

5 Albums That Did Not Suck as Much as Some People Said
5. Actually, most albums I heard pretty much sucked this year.
4. Keane, Under the Iron Sea (No, this is not a contradiction.)
3. Starsailor, On the Outside
2. The Mars Volta, Amputechture
1. The Strokes, First Impressions of Earth

5 Favorite Songs
5. Snow Patrol, "Chasing Cars"
4. Gomez, "Notice"
3. Band of Horses, "The Funeral"
2. Bravestate, "Reign of Terror"
1. Muse, "City of Delusion"

5 Favorite Albums
5. Neko Case, Fox Confessor Brings the Blood
4. Gomez, How to Operate
3. Nas, Hip Hop is Dead
2. Muse, Black Holes and Revelations
1. The Decemberists, The Crane Wife

Tuesday, December 26, 2006

Don't Know What You Don't Got Til It's There

A few thoughts ran through my head after my parents sat us down and informed us that our house was going up for sale. I couldn't believe that soon I wouldn't be able to jump off the diving board into our Better Homes & Gardens swimming pool, the one fully equipped with the outer picket fence and polaris that shimmied through the water and removed any unsightly debris. I wondered how there could ever be a house to replace this one that would always be my childhood home. My mind passed through a few more thoughts along these lines, until I got to the one where I was scared that I would be pulled away from the girl I loved, the one I needed to be with.

It turned out that we would only be moving one block over, in the same neighborhood, going to the same schools, being with the same people. To my relief, I wouldn't have to lose her, wouldn't have to say goodbye, wouldn't have to make a last-second confession of my true feelings as we embraced in a farewell kiss amidst a suddenly appearing thunderstorm. Not in 13 years of my life had I felt something like this, and I didn't know how it could get any better.

She had it all. She was pretty. She was nice. She was pretty. I knew everything about her: her middle name, what period she had earth science, her favorite movie. I'd never told her how I felt, even though I knew deep down she felt the same. Maybe one day our love would bring us together.



We slowly made our way down the stairs among the masses of people trying to get outside and call for the nearest cab. I censored my real opinions when responding to my friends' questions about what I thought of the opera we'd just seen. It wasn't yet appropriate to say that I found the brass poorly tuned and the solo singers uninspired. That wasn't the bottom line of this night. What really mattered was that we'd just seen the opera, that it was something available for us to experience, and that we did it. In the end, that made the night a success.

A few nights later, these friends were among others gathered in my dining room. It was the second or third of what we hoped would become a tradition: Sunday dinner. It was an event I'd once spoken so fondly of as a staple of my Italian and Puerto Rican roots, something I'd done with my family in my days back home. These people wanted to experience that too. We were still getting to know each other, part of our own new family of aspiring Ph.D.'ers. Among the outstanding food, laughs, photographs, and stories of days past, it became apparent that we could have an invaluable scrapbook together 5 years down the road.

These were things I'd never felt were possible at a similar magnitude in my former city. There were many lonesome days there. I'm not going to lie: I was happy to say goodbye to that town. I'd long grown tired of knowing that about the half the time, the highlight of my slowly crawling day would be whenever I laughed at something said online.

It wasn't that I didn't meet great people there (because I did) or that I didn't find anything there for me (because I did). What happened was that through my occasional visits to the city I'd later call my home, I knew that any happiness I felt I had in my life at the time paled in comparison to what I could have when surrounded by a backdrop that better suited the needs of an inspired guy in his mid-twenties trying to find himself among a diverse culture he'd felt isolated from.



After I gained more years of life and maturity, I was able to laugh at myself and my distorted perceptions of love. To think that despite the warnings from my elders that 13-year-olds don't know what love is, I thought, exactly like everybody else did at the time, that I was like nobody else at the time. I was different.

Years later, with a far-different girl in a far-different life, I knew what it meant to love. I'd never seen that I needed to go beyond knowing what made her laugh and cry to WHY she was touched in those ways, what mattered enough to her to touch her soul. I'd never seen that I could find someone as beautiful lying pale sick in bed as when she'd spent 2 hours getting ready for our date. I'd never seen that many of the sacrifices I made for true love didn't seem at all like sacrifices at the time.

I never knew this until I had it.



When my friends from past lives have called to hear how I'm doing, I never fail to convey how refreshed I am to enjoy the present day. My situation today is what I've been saying I wanted for over a year now, and when the opportunity came for life to call my bluff, I didn't back down. I took the chance and am reaping the benefits.

It has nothing to do with feeling I'm doing something meaningful and special with my days. It has nothing to do with randomly bumping into Bob Dylan or Pootietang. It has nothing to do with the knowledge that I can essentially hear any music I want in a matter of months. It has nothing to do with walking by restaurants serving food I could only pray to experience. It has nothing to do with spending my days surrounded by people of all colors, names of origin, sexualities, ideals, outlooks, and personalities.

It has everything to do with knowing I'm taking full advantage of the entire package.



She called because she was concerned about me. I'd sent her an e-mail the night before and explained the bad news. He probably had cancer, but we'd find out in a few days. It was possible that this could be the last Christmas with him around.

I was taking the news rather well, she said. She'd heard me tell many stories about my grandfather and thought there'd probably be a void there if he were gone. She was right. Having lost my other grandfather when I was 8, he's the only grandfather I've known since I could appreciate those relationships. I'd miss him for sure.

She wondered why I didn't seem sad on the phone. It didn't sound like I was in denial or that I didn't love him. Neither statement would have been true. What happened is that when I'd moved into close-enough distance to him, I'd made the effort to make an ocasional visit. We had new memories and stories the rest of my family didn't share. I didn't know if one day there'd be cancer, but I did know that his funeral would have to come some day.

When we got the news about cancer, I didn't know if I'd see him for much longer, but I did know that I took advantage of the time I'd had. I'd never be satisfied, always wanting one more day with him, but I'd always have comfort in knowing that each present day would pass without regret. I wasn't ready to say goodbye, but if I had to, at least I'd know I did what I could.



I'd always heard you don't see what you've got until it's gone. It seemed to me that with the important things, I didn't see what I was missing until I found it. In the meantime, I'll just keep looking.

Monday, July 31, 2006

Just So You Know...

Almost done with my thesis.
Training for my first boxing match.
Move to New York late August.

Hope to find time and inspiration to write something soon.